Black Gods of the Metropolis: African American Urban Religion during the Great Migration Tuesday and Thursdays 12:30 pm to 1:50. Library 252
Gregory Nelson Hite, Ph.D. New College of Florida The Keating Center Wednesday 10:30 am to 2:00 pm & by appointment o: 941-487-4681 c: 941-685-6930 ghite@ncf.edu	Table of Contents Course Description Course Requirements Schedule Suggestions for Writing a Term Paper Citations Peer Review Form Groups Writing Center

Course Description

This course will examine the role of religion in the the Great Migration (1910-1950) of African Americans from the rural South to the urban North. How did religious institutions enable poor Southern migrants to make the journey? How did their theology enable them to make sense of the process of migration? What new forms of religious expression emerged as a result of this cultural and geographic shift? What was the dominant form of African American religion in the Urban North and how did those institutions address the masses of migrants? What explains the rise of alternative African American religious groups during this period? Students will meet to discuss readings with the instructor on a bi-weekly basis and the last four weeks of the term will be reserved for research and peer review of papers. Students must participate on a regular basis in classroom discussions of the readings and will be required to write a substantial term paper ona subject chosen in consulation with the instructor.

Course Requirements:

• Weekly Discussion and Participation.
• Term Paper.  A fifteen to twenty-page term paper on a topic chosen in consultation with the instructor.

Textbooks:

1. Wallace Best. Passionately Human, No Less Divine.
2. John McGreevy. Parish Boundaries.
3. Jill Watts. God: Harlem USA.
4. Claude Clegg III. An Original Man.

Schedule:

Week 1
February 6, 8
Overview of African American Religion

W.E.B. DuBois. The Souls of Black Folk.

Timothy Fullop, "The Future Golden Day of the Race: Millennialism and Black Americans in the Nadir, 1877-1901.”

Elias C. Morris. 1899 presidential Address to the National Bapist Convention.

Week 2
February 13, 15
African American Folk Traditions and the Great Migration

Carole Marks. In Search of the Promised Land: Black Migration and Urbanization, 1900-1940.

Elizabeth Clark Lewis. Living in, Living Out: African American Domestics in Washington D.C., 1910-1940

Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, “The Black Church: A Gender Perspective."

Week 3
February 20, 22
Chicago

Best. Passionatley Human, No Less Divine. (All)

Week 4
February 27, March 1
Religion and The Harlem Rennaissance

See Handout.

Week 5
March 6, 8

Catholics and Race

McGreevy. Parish Boundaries (ALL)

Week 6
March 20, 22

Marcus Garvey

TBA

Film: Look for Me in the Whirlwind

Spring Break
No Class March 27, 29

Week 7
April 3, 5

Father Divine

Watts. God:Harlem, USA (All)

Week 8
April 10, 12

Father Divine II

Week 9
April 17, 19

Nation of Islam

Clegg III An Ordinary Man (All)

Week 10
April 24, 26

Research Week for Final Projects

Week 11
May 1, 3
Research Week for Final Projects

Week 12
May 8, 10
Research Week for Final Projects

Week 13
May 15, 17

Research Week for Final Projects

No Class

Final Projects Due Friday 5 pm